Andrew Lansley could be an improvement on Baroness Amos as UN humanitarian chief. That is not saying much. For Labour to complain about “cronyism” is breathtaking hypocrisy as Amos is the ultimate Blair crony. She rose to the top of UK politics – a full Cabinet minister – despite the fact that not one citizen has had the chance to vote for or against her, ever. At least Lansley had the guts to face the electorate. My two campaigns to stand as an Independent for parliament were failures, but the 3,000 votes I received were 3,000 more than Amos has ever got. Amos is the very symbol of the corruption of the UK political system. She is Red Tory through and through, so it is unsurprising that when Cameron became PM with her nomination process still in train, he was quite happy for it to continue to go through.
At the UN, Amos’ attention to humanitarian disaster differed according to where they stood on the neo-con agenda. When the BBC was in the midst of their campaign to promote war against Assad on behalf of the jihadists, she was continually all over the BBC saying something needed urgently to be done. When the Israelis were slaughtering innocents in Gaza, she was notably less prominent.
Her unelected career has been very lucrative. She has a web of company interests which have been significantly furthered by the positions she has held. And while at the UN, she has claimed exemption from declaring her business interests on the House of Lords register.
The following extract from my book The Catholic Orangemen of Togo may open some eyes about the way the senior levels of the Labour Party operate:
The concierge opened the door and the Nigerian detached himself from the rich leather upholstery of the sleek, silver, range-topping Mercedes. He stalked into the lounge of the Sheraton, as glossy as the sheen on his Italian silk suit and as smooth as the mirrored lenses of his designer spectacles. My heart sank as he headed towards our little group. I had taken on the chairmanship of a Ghanaian energy company to help out some Ghanaian friends. Our little venture had prospered and we were looking to expand across West Africa. In doing so I was determined to steer well clear of capital tainted with corruption or drugs. My surest guide to doing that was to avoid people who looked and dressed like this man whom my colleagues had arranged to talk with us.
West Africa is now the third largest centre in the World for money laundering and narcotics capital formation. But in terms of the percentage of total capital formation which drugs money forms, it is far ahead. Money laundering is the raison d’etre of many West African financial institutions. In Accra in March 2008 a World Bank sponsored conference held in Accra on money laundering heard an estimate that over 60% of the capital of the mushrooming private banking sector in Nigeria could be drugs money. Recently Nigerian banks have started taking out huge poster adverts all over the UK’s major airports. That is drugs money.
One consequence of this is that I have found it too easy to attract the wrong kind of capital to a legitimate business proposal in West Africa. These investors from West African banks and private equity firms are not even expecting the kind of high returns that a high risk market normally demands. With anti money-laundering regulations now so tight in the US and EU, their investors are looking to launder the money in the region before sending it to Europe. The proceeds of a legitimate energy company are accountable and clean; so we attract those wishing to put dirty money in to get clean money out. The actual bank executives and fund managers are of course not themselves necessarily involved in narcotics; they just fail to query adequately the source of their investor’s cash.
So when the new arrival introduced himself as a manager of a Nigerian private equity firm, I mentally switched off. I giggled inwardly as he named his company as “Travant”, because I thought he said “Trabant”, which given the car out of which he had just stepped, would have been wildly inappropriate. But I came to with a start when he said that his Nigerian private equity firm had access to DFID funds because Baroness Amos was a Director. To be clear, I asked whether Travant was an NGO or a governmental investment agency. He replied that it was not; it was a private, for-profit fund management company.
Baroness Amos was of course the Secretary of State for DFID until 2003 and until 2007 was Leader of the House of Lords. I though that it was impossible that DFID money would be given to a company of which she was Director. On the face of it, nobody could look further removed from the development aid ethos than the man in the designer suit. I went back to writing him off, deciding he was simply making it up about Baroness Amos and his access to DFID money. In West Africa among people who wear silk suits and are driven in Mercedes, the standards of truthfulness sadly leave in general a great deal to be desired.
I would have forgotten the incident, but in December 2008 I found myself sitting next to Baroness Amos on an airport bus heading for the plane to Accra. Once on board she moved to Business class while due to overbooking I was downgraded to Economy Plus. Baroness Amos was going out to Accra to head the Commonwealth monitoring team for the first round of the 2008 Ghanaian elections, as John Kufuor retired. Sending Baroness Amos to monitor an election seemed to me another tremendous example of British arrogance. Valerie Amos is the very antithesis of a democratic politician. One of the Blair inner circle, she rose to Cabinet rank despite never having faced the electorate. Never, ever, at any level of politics. Her entire career was based upon New Labour internal patronage after making a very good living out of complaining about discrimination against minorities in the UK. She opened up a substantial income gap between herself and those on whose behalf she was claiming to work, from a very early stage, and that gap has widened ever since.
All this came back to me as I looked at Baroness Amos quaffing champagne on that plane. So I did a bit of digging. Valerie Amos is indeed listed on their website as a non-executive director of Travant Private Equity, one of only five directors. There is nothing about developmental goals, ethics, or the environment on the website. There is a lot about real estate opportunities in West Africa (by which they do not mean housing for the urban poor), and a boast that they have “the largest fundraising from domestic investors in sub-Saharan Africa”. Remember what I said about the sources of local capital formation? Now Travant may have the most rigorous procedures for scrutinising the origin of the domestic money deposited with them. But if they do, they do not mention it on their website. Rather they emphasise that “we are deeply immersed in the business communities in which we invest”. Mmmm.
But have Travant received DFID money? On the face of it, Travant shouldn’t even want public money ? They are aggressive proponents of the capitalist ethos: “We believe that the private sector, with appropriate oversight and governance, is the best shepherd of Africa’s resources. We seek to empower entrepreneurs to pursue opportunities that they have identified, creating returns for investors, jobs and economic growth.” Yet in 2007 the British Government financed Travant with £15 million of funds, provided through CDC, the investment arm of DFID. CDC is owned 100% by DFID. At launch over one third of Travant’s first equity fund came from DFID. A few months afterwards Baroness Amos, ex minister in charge of DFID, joined the board of this profit-making firm.
It says everything about New Labour that CDC, which as the Commonwealth Development Corporation used to run agricultural projects to benefit the rural poor, was rebranded as CDC with a new remit to provide most of its funds to the financial services industry. It says even more about New Labour’s lack of the understanding of fundamental personal ethics, of their embrace of greed, that they see no reason why one of their former senior ministers should not move to benefit personally from the DFID money – even if through a 100% owned satellite – thus invested.
To turn this story full circle, let us turn back to Sierra Leone. 65% of the measured exports of this country come from its rutile mines. These were under guard by Sandline at the start of this memoir. Following the British invasion of Sierra Leone, it returned to its normal state of extreme corruption. Life is hard for most of its inhabitants, and UN donated food and pharmaceuticals, clearly marked “not for sale”, are only available to the local population for cash they do not have, as the result of collusion between corrupt UN officials, government officials, and mostly Lebanese traders. But the rutile mines are working full out, and extremely profitable, with armed white men again in charge of security. A major rutile miner, Titanium Resources Group of Sierra Leone says in its 2008 interim report: “the long term future of our markets is sound and the quality and scale of our mineral reserves underline our future prospects.” The Chairman of Titanium Resources Group is Walter Kansteiner III, George Bush’s former Assistant Secretary of Sate for Africa and a founding partner of the Scowcroft Group, led by Brent Scowcroft, George Bush’s National Security Adviser and architect of the CIA’s re-introduction of torture. The Scowcroft Group advisory consultancy did huge harm in Africa in the 1990s with their advocacy of privatisation and deregulation, particularly in the forestry sector, and with some influence advocated policies worldwide which contributed to the credit bubble and collapse of recent years.
But none of that prevented Kansteiner and Scowcroft from making money out of it, and Blair’s invasion secured Sierra Leone’s mineral resources to the neo-cons. Not everyone benefits. Titanium Resources’ Interim Report 2008 mentions the disruption in production as a result of the collapse of a dredger, without feeling the need even to mention the two Sierra Leoneans who died in the incident.
But New Labour believes in profit, especially for themselves, so it was no surprise to me when Titanium Resources announced in March 2008 the appointment of Baroness Amos as a non-executive director. For me that appointment [though she later resigned] sums up the cosiness of the alliance between Bush, Blair and their acolytes. It was an alliance based on the acquisition of mineral resources by any means possible. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are the most infamous example. I saw it close up operating by war in Sierra Leone, and by the diplomacy of repression in Uzbekistan.
Yep,Mary, 200- million helping to fight IS, ehem, or to buy the life’s of two hostages, heads or tails does not exist on a double headed coin.
dare I say its like take it or leave it in the AV referendum, you knew it would fail.
Why does the poster at 5:59 pm feel it necessary to be so vile about someone else’s wedding?
(And what’s special about an ex-Para anyway?)
Why does the poster at 9.45 take exception to what the poster at 5.59 had to say about ‘someone else’s’ (thanks for the apt description of that someone else) wedding?
nothing special about a para, poster at 8.45, nothing at all, but they are always para’s, never x’s.
off course the first poster should be 8.45, glasses…..
What’s the difference between a British jihadist in Syria and a British private military contractor in Syria?
One of them murders innocent people
* because he is a barbarian idealist who believes in a heap of shit
* who obeys superiors who line their pockets
* and who may be keen on a video of him doing it going on Youtube, even if the final video is edited – er, sorry, qualified, by Rita Katz’s SITE.
The other murders innocent people
* because he is a barbarian pragmatist who wants to line his pockets
* who obeys superiors who make even more profit than he does
* and who won’t be keen on his killings coming out into the open at all.
You kind of wish they’d get together with each other when no-one else is around. The jihadist could do without the cameraman and the private military contractor could do without the money. Then the scum could kill each other.
“they are always para’s, never x’s.”
Tell that to the poster who first called him an “ex-Para” at 5.59 in the course of her bitchy comment:
“Any little Smith McFadzeans on the way? I see she got her man, an ex Para no less.”
The long-awaited Chilcot inquiry into the Iraq War will not be published until after the General Election, Government sources say.
http://news.sky.com/uk
Has the 8.45pm poster from across the Irish Sea ever heard of the Norwich North by-election in 2009 and the shenanigans that ensued which deprived Craig of a fair chance of being elected?
Careful now. The little spasm of bitchiness is obvious. 🙂
This is quite good.
It looks at Edward Mandell House’s anonymously published, futuristic political novel, Philip Dru: Administrator, of which Conservative historian Paul Johnson wrote:
“Oddly enough, in 1911 he [House] had published a political novel, Philip Dru: Administrator, in which a benevolent dictator imposed a corporate income tax, abolished the protective tariff, and broke up the ‘credit trust’—a remarkable adumbration of [Woodrow] Wilson and his first term.”
Yes. House was a grey eminence, a behind the scenes operator. Much bigger individually than even Kissinger in his day.
Anyway here’s the book:
https://archive.org/stream/philipdruadmini00housgoog#page/n13/mode/2up
Here’s the discussion:
https://www.corbettreport.com/philip-dru-flnwo-23/
Explains a lot about how the behind the scenes guys operate and why things change the way they do.
“Has the 8.45pm poster from across the Irish Sea ever heard of the Norwich North by-election in 2009 … ”
I was here at the time, missus.
And that’s your explanation for your bitchy comment? The Norwich North by-election? Maybe you thought it would appeal to Craig.
“The little spasm of bitchiness is obvious.”
Yes it was. But not untypical for you.
@Dreolin: cleverly slipped that one in didn’t they. Isn’t DC clever? And not a murmur from Ed.
Fool – I read the Orangemen of Togo and wondered whether there would be libel proceedings re the above, but I guess there were not.
Craig – Of course there weren’t libel proceedings. It is all true.
And thank god you still live in a country where the truth is a defense. In many places (I’m thinking Russia in particular) just because you are telling the truth doesn’t mean you can’t be prosecuted, shut down, or much worse. Some countries in Asia that we consider quite “democratic” have laws that make it illegal to say anything that will damage certain institutions. If prosecuted, the fact that what you said may have been true is entirely irrelevant. Fight to keep those freedoms, I guess, but it shows that “The West” is not as bad as some would make out, if you consider the other options.
And thank god you still live in a country where the truth is a defense.
Unless your name is Julian Assange, of course…
So yes, fight to keep those freedoms but don’t assume that the grass is always greener on the other side.
@ Herbie
No offence but can not use the word quite in “quite good”
It’s either good or it’s not!
@Jay:
‘Good’ is not an absolute. It can be ‘quite good’. OTOH, something can’t be ‘quite perfect’ in the sense of being less than ‘perfectly perfect’, although it can be ‘quite perfect’ in the sense of being absolutely perfect and without flaw. ‘Quite’, here, cannot be used as a modifier of ‘good’, because good isn’t an absolute. Etc.
Grammar nazi…
ba’al
Thanks. That’s nice…. one.
I call it pedantry.
As always, I need additional modifying too.
HoC PMQs 7.1.15
Elfyn Llwyd (PC Westminster Leader, Shadow PC Spokesperson (Constitution), Shadow PC Spokesperson (Foreign Affairs), Shadow PC Spokesperson (Justice), Shadow PC Spokesperson (Defence), Shadow PC Spokesperson (Environment, Food and Rural Affairs), Shadow PC Spokesperson (Wales); Dwyfor Meirionnydd, Plaid Cymru)
Those of us who opposed the Iraq war, for very good reason, and many, many other people outside this place are very concerned about the inordinate delay in publishing the findings of the Chilcot report. May I please ask the Prime Minister: where did this bizarre notion that if it is not published before the end of February, we cannot see it until after the election come from? What about the month of March?
David Cameron (The Prime Minister; Witney, Conservative)
In many ways I share the right hon. Gentleman’s frustration: I would love the report to have come out already. Indeed, he and I voted together against the last Labour Government over and over again, saying, “Please can you get on and set up the independent inquiry that’s needed?” If they had got on and set up the independent inquiry, it would have been published, debated and dealt with by now, so I find it immensely frustrating, but it is not a matter for me. I am not able to order the publication of the report. It is independent: it is up to Sir John Chilcot when he publishes his report. He will make the decision, not me.
~~~
Peter Tapsell (Father of the House of Commons; Louth and Horncastle, Conservative)
Reverting to the subject of the Chilcot report, about which I have questioned the Prime Minister in the past, did my right hon. Friend note that our distinguished colleague Lord Hurd said in the House of Lords yesterday said that it was an absolute disgrace that it had not been published—a view that I certainly hold? Since it is absolutely well known by the cognoscenti that the report was completed many months ago, who—if the Prime Minister is helpless on this subject—is blocking it? Is it the Cabinet Secretary or Sir John Chilcot, or is it the White House?
David Cameron (The Prime Minister; Witney, Conservative)
I say to the Father of the House that I understand that the report is largely finished, but with every report such as this there is a process: we have to write to the people who are criticised and give them an opportunity to respond. This is now the process for all these reports, irrespective of which Government they are launched under. It is known as the Salmondisation process—although I am not quite sure why, as I do not think it has anything to do with the former First Minister of Scotland. It is not within my power to grant the publication of this report. It is independent and under Sir John Chilcot, and the process has to be finished—then the report will be published.
Lots of ironic laughs all round.
Chilcot and Cameron letters 21.1.15
http://www.iraqinquiry.org.uk/news/update_on_inquiry_progress_-_january_2015.aspx
No irony whatsoever.
Iraq Inquiry costs for the financial year 2013 to 2014
The Iraq Inquiry has published the final expenditure for the financial years 2009/10, 2010/11, 2011/12 and 2012/13. The expenditure for 2013/14 is shown below.
The total expenditure since 2009 is £9,016,500.
Description
Inquiry Secretariat staff costs £895,500
Committee and Advisers’ remuneration £201,100
Public hearings £0
Private hearings £0
Other events £0
Travel £200
Office accommodation £241,300
IT & telecommunications (includes website management & development) £196,100
Publications (includes books, subscriptions & press cuttings service) £2,300
Stationery (includes postage & general office supplies) £600
Other costs £0
Total £1,537,100
“cleverly slipped that one in didn’t they”
Peacewisher, every single one of them has a brass neck, if you ask me.
To be elected these days, all you need is a mediocre IQ, a brass neck, and the ability to lie with a straight face.
Thanks. That’s nice…. one.
I call it pedantry.
A pleasure to be of service. 🙂
Mary – this from Cameron indicates that he is either indulging in an incomprehensible joke or his marbles are slipping away from him:
…we have to write to the people who are criticised and give them an opportunity to respond. This is now the process for all these reports, irrespective of which Government they are launched under. It is known as the Salmondisation process—although I am not quite sure why, as I do not think it has anything to do with the former First Minister of Scotland.
1. It is universally known as Maxwellisation, after the criminal of the same name*. I have never seen it called anything else. Is this our slimy Carlton teaboy attempting to rewrite the dictionary? Not content with ‘hardworkingfamilies’ and ‘benefitcheat’?
2. Chilcot (pdf letter on link below) in 2012 was anticipating that the Maxwellisation process would begin in mid 2013. WTF is taking so long? The answer can only be that someone being Maxwellised is stalling the process.
*
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxwellisation
The total expenditure since 2009 is £9,016,500.
Worth every penny if it puts Blair behind bars…
Robert Crawford
Sorry, wasn’t meant to be.
“In June last year, Chilcot announced he was satisfied that the “gist” of talks between Blair and Bush could be made public, removing a big obstacle to publication of his report. Chilcot is understood to have sent “Salmon letters” to those who were to be criticised to give them an opportunity to respond before the report’s publication, which will have led to further delays following objections from those criticised.”
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jan/21/chilcott-summoned-parliament-iraq-war-report-delays
Salmon letters??
Aha. All is now clear.
Salmon letters, named after Lord Salmon who held an inquiry into public ethics in the 1970s, are designed to give people potentially facing direct criticism from an official inquiry a chance to reply before a report is published.
http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2007/jan/18/menezes.vikramdodd
Ba’al Zevul – “if it puts Blair behind bars…”. This is the British establishment investigating itself at its liesure. The members were hand picked for their sympathies. One of them is on record as likening the invaders Bush and Blair to Roosevelt and Churchill.
There might be some mild rebukes amongst the carefully crafted whitewash. But not much more.
Thanks Ba’al
Speaking of Grammar Nazis, I read this yesterday (and believed it)
“Employers spend an average of just 8.8 seconds reviewing each CV they receive, new research has found.
These are the top 10 CV faux pas that are likely to land applicants in the “no” pile, according to the survey of 500 employers…
1. Bad grammar
2. Spelling mistakes ”
See the rest here
http://i100.independent.co.uk/article/the-10-worst-mistakes-you-can-make-on-your-cv–e19IA9-zjl
I wundad y i din get da job. Thort it woz becoz i calld da boss a twat…
Je – I said IF. Think it goes without saying that failing a deep vein thrombosis due to all those airmiles, or one of his omnipresent bodyguards* succumbing to the natural urge to strangle him, the bastard Blair is going to be with the extremely rich, if not with us, for a while yet.
*taxpayer-funded
One of them is on record as likening the invaders Bush and Blair to Roosevelt and Churchill.
How are the mighty fallen. Last week, after His Sublime Omniscience had deigned to address a US Republican strategy talkathon at Hershey, PA, one of the brighter of the knuckledraggers present came away with this –
“Tony Blair just gave one of the most masterful presentations on the spread of Islamic terrorism,…Churchillian.” (Oklahoma Rep. Tom Cole)
Cole did both an MA and a PhD in British history, apparently without reading anything by Churchill, then. Cole himself would seem to be more fossil-energy-dependent than Blair’s Climate Change Initiative (deceased, 2011) might find compatible, but hey…
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Tom_Cole
A model rant here. Should appeal to the philosophers among us. Carefully constructed, thoughtfully paced, probably true. Enjoy.
http://www.truthasauthority.com/2015/01/21/tony-blair-creature-forbidden-swamp/